Sailing the Bluenose

So it took almost no time to get the Bluenose sailing. The guy we bought it from had everything we needed for a mainsheet, but never attached it. It took us 10 minutes to get that attached. On the other side of the boom, we created what I guess you would call a down haul to keep the boom from raising too far up. At this point we don't have boomvang and I expect we'll be vangless for quite some time.
Charlie and I quickly discovered that our sailing skills hadn't really been tested in the forgiving waters of Santa Barbara's harbor, where we puttered around on nice big catalina sloops. There are rarely any currents, the tides are minimal, there is plenty of room to get in and out and most of the sailing is done on open ocean. We would only change direction when we were bored.
Morro Bay is a horse of a different color. The tides vary greatly and can get down below 3 or 4 feet at low tide in the little marina (our draft is 3' 10"). You have to follow a very skinny channel that has several zig zags just to get to the main part of the harbor and if you go even a few feet in either direction, you can run aground (I won't tell you how I know that - but take my word for it!). It took us awhile to figure out the little 4 hp outboard engine, but it seems to be a steady performer now. Then there is the current. When the tide comes in, so do some 3 or 4 knot currents and a wind heading pretty much straight in your face. Thus, we have learned to tack back and forth in this little channel (cheating on occasion through the moorings). If it is not efficient, we make no ground on the current. We could, of course, motor through all this to get to the ocean, but for now we are learning the boat and working on our skills before we venture out. This is also a much rougher sea than you find in Santa Barbara. The mouth of the Harbor (near Morro Rock) is small and if we get caught in a good current out there, we could potentially be drifting down to Avila Bay or beyond. Add to that the frequent appearance of pea soup fog in Morro Bay and you can see why we are proceeding with a certain amount of caution.
The boat sails pretty well. It has a fractional jib (not all the way up the mainsail). The steerage is alright unless we are going slowly, in which case it can be hard to get some steerage, which we learned the hard way. The hull is probably dragging a bit of a barnacle beard, but we haven't had a look yet. Generally, it handles well. The speed is fair, but I think would be better if we scraped and painted it, a project for this winter, most likely.
Meanwhile, we are learning to sail...

See How the Main Sail Sets

Okay, we got the mainsail up the other day and I forgot to mention it. We went by the previous owner's place and picked up the manuals for the little 4 hp outboard engine and he told us how to rig up the mainsheet. He had already bought the blocks for it and we put the mainsheet together in about 10 minutes. Then we basically tied the boom down to the bottom of the mast, leaving a little slack for the boom to rise under wind. We don't have a boomvang, so this I think would be better termed a downhaul. In any case, we thought it was good enough to head out and try.
The sail came up without much difficulty. Unfortunately, the wind died on us and we were going against a pretty strong current, but we were able to move slowly through the bay. Hopefully, there will be better wind next time around, but it felt good under sail, considering. I'm still working on getting some pictures. My camera needed a new battery charger.

Took a look at the mast/boom

We decided to drop by and take a look at the boat, to figure out what we need to do to get the mainsail up and running. Charlie was intent on getting out on the water, so we detoured from our mission and headed out back on the bay. A guy from a neighboring slip came by and gave us an old sailing magazine that had a story about the Bluenose Sloops. He was a nice guy who has a similar sized boat and comes out to sail on days when he isn't getting dialysis. I think we were trying a little too hard to impress him, so I motored the boat out too quickly (it is idling too fast) and Charlie had to do a save as we headed toward another boat. Once we got past that, though, we were back in the channel and heading into the main harbor. The current was a bit stronger and there was a pretty good wind, but we were still stuck jib-sailing. Still good fun, but it is sure hard to close-haul with a jib.
We got back in and still has a bit of time to look at the mast/boom. The boom is resting at the bottom of the mast and needs to be brought up about a foot and a half. This will be our first order of business. I think it will take a trip to Home Depot to find some hardware that will allow the boom connector to sit up higher on the mast. I won't be around for the holiday weekend, so it will be sometime next week before we start on that. Then we will need to figure out how to rig the boomvang, cunningham and mainsheet. We only have a couple of small pictures of working Bluenose sloops to go by, so we will have to be creative when getting this together.